Caribbean: a novel Part 33

While he spread his blanket and laid out the delicacies he had purchased at Tudor, Millard looked about the area atop the cap and down into the cove that housed the beach. What he saw confirmed Bart's a.n.a.lysis of his island, for although he saw some eight or nine groups picnicking, each was off to itself and severely restricted in color. Whites ate with whites, light coloreds with their like, and rowdy blacks sang with their own kind. The beautiful cap and its beach were in no way segregated; anyone could eat anywhere, but he had better eat with his own color.

Wrentham had placed the blanket so that his American guest could lean comfortably against a rather large rock, and as the two men drank beer, munched sandwiches and nibbled at fine English biscuits and tartlets, Bart resumed his instruction: 'On the hill behind Gommint House, which I'm sure you saw from your ship, there's a building of no great distinction surrounded by tennis courts, bowling greens and croquet lawns. That's The Club, and it is severely restricted to an all-white membership. Most of the people in levels one through three, including especially the French ... Incidentally, the French speak little French. Their names announce them, not their verb forms. What was I saying?'

'Membership in The Club.'

'Well now. Suppose for a moment that you did emigrate here. Satisfied the paperwork and all that. You behave yourself. Pay your bills. Act with respect toward your superiors. You could still fail to be accepted.'

'Why?'

'You're not English. And you are American. And that means you've got to be an uncultivated boor.'

'So I'll never see this glorious club?'

'Of course you will! You can be invited there, but to be an actual member, never.'

'Is it pretty posh?'

'Heavens, no! Dues are minimal. Decor is deplorable, I'm told. I've never been allowed in, you understand. But I'm told its attraction is that it's like a coc.o.o.n or a womb. Your own kind of people. Your own color.'

'Who runs it?'

'The women, fiercely. The wives of the senior officials, aided, of course, by Major Leckey. He's in charge of seeing that it remains pure.'

'Who's he?'

'The Gee-Gee's aide-de-camp. Been here for years. Had a fine reputation in India, good regiment and all that. Major Devon Leckey. And if he takes a dislike to you, or if his madam, Pamela, does, you might as well pack up and leave, because he and the divine Pam rule the roost.'

'How?'

'They more or less determine what group you fit into. What affairs it would be proper to invite you to. Who would be urged to attend if your daughter gets married on the island.'

'An ugly type?'

'No, no! The Leckeys are the salt of the English earth. He didn't get three medals and a mention in dispatches because he's a dolt. He can trounce you at tennis, that I'll wager.' He hesitated, took a large bite of sausage roll, then summarized his reaction to the ineffable major: 'I find it difficult to like men who are a stone and half underweight and who have all their hair the color it was twenty years ago.' Then he added a note of serious caution: 'If you want to see All Saints at its best, you must build a bridge to Major Leckey. If you do, all doors will be opened-invitations to Gommint House, dance at The Club, the interviews you seek. If you don't ... Siberia!'

'And how do I build that bridge?'

'I'll tell you, old chap, it won't be easy and I'm not teasing. Our tourist ships drop off scores of Americans and Canadians like you ... often people of considerable wealth and power back home. Here they're boors. Refuse to do things the British way, try to muscle their way in. And all they get is rebuffs. Major Leckey and his wife refuse even to see them. They never get to see Gee-Gee. And they go home cursing All Saints as an unfriendly place where the blacks are abused. That's what'll happen to you, old chap, if you hang around with the likes of me and don't get friendly with the Leckeys.'

'And how do I do that?'

'You follow the traditions, long ingrained, of the British colony. You go to Gommint House before nightfall on the day of your arrival and sign the visitors' book, to let the officials know you're in town and are paying your proper respects. Then you present your credentials to a.s.sure people that you're who you say you are and that someone in the echelon higher than yourself back home is vouching for you. Then you retire to your hotel room, behave yourself in public at meals, and wait.'

'Would my being seen in your saloon be a help or a hindrance?'

Wrentham laughed. 'You're a bright lad, McKay. It would alert those who matter that you're no better than a seven or eight despite your white skin.'

'But if I do the things you suggested, would I be accepted in, say, level three?'

'Laddie! The government of this island is not stupid. They seek good reports in American newspapers. To augment tourism, if nothing else. You behave yourself, Major Leckey will be falling all over you. But not if you try to bull yourself in. Try that and you're cut off, like a dead limb.'

'But if I reported that sn.o.bbery in my articles?'

'You'd never do that, laddie. Because you're part of the system. I can see from our brief conversation that you're prime club material. You already enjoy this island more than I do.'

A light-skinned couple who had been picnicking not far away recognized Wrentham and walked slowly over: 'Hullo, Bart, shall we be seeing you at The Tennis tonight?'

'Of course. Save me a place at your table. This is my friend just in from America, Mr. Detroit Newspaperman.'

The greetings were cordial, with the woman saying: 'If we can do anything to help while you're here, call upon us. Roger has the importing business not far from Bart's Waterloo.'

When they were gone, Millard asked: 'What's this with tennis? You have lighted courts for night play, or what?'

'Now we come to the next part of the a.n.a.lysis. The Tennis, just that, nothing more to the name, is for light-colored blacks what The Club is for the whites. It's a rather nice building facing Anse de Jour, and its membership is just as exclusive in its way as The Club's. Even men and women of real accomplishment will never be eligible for The Club because their skins are ... well ...' He pointed to his face and laughed: 'I didn't go to university in England, but many young fellows like me do. If they're good at sports, which most of them are, they're feted in Britain. Membership in good clubs, invited everywhere, move in exciting circles. If they can write stories, they become popular literary figures. Four years, maybe five, of living at the heart of empire. Then bang! Party's over. Back on the boat they come to All Saints, and when they step onto our dock, Cinderella's ball ends. They're colored again. And although they can get good jobs in government, and they do, they can never, never, join The Club where the real leaders celebrate at night, or even attend a ball there as guests. But they can join The Tennis.'

Saying no more, he gathered the remnants of the picnic, threw the rubbish in a green-painted oil drum placed for such purpose, and started the drive down the western half of the island. As McKay watched the Caribbean, a sea of splendor in this lat.i.tude, his eye caught a sight which would enthrall him as long as he was in the islands: a hedge of low shrubs whose big copious leaves were multicolored, six blazingly different leaves to one stem, five radically different colors to each leaf.

'What's that magnificent thing?' he cried, and Wrentham replied: 'Croton, symbol of the Caribbean. One central stalk, many contrasting colors,' and Millard said: 'A man could grow to love an oceanfront highway decorated with such flowers.'

Ten miles of croton along the road brought them to the golden beach of Anse de Jour, and to The Tennis. As they pa.s.sed the low, beautifully landscaped building Wrentham said: 'It's better kept, really, than The Club. But that's as it should be. Its job is to hide a lot of heartache.'

'That's two clubs, highly restricted,' Millard said. 'Where are the clubs for the bulk of the population?'

'What do you think my Waterloo is? That's where those who can't get into the other two can meet and have fun. You'll be welcomed at the Waterloo. And you'll be able to find many of the people you'd like to meet.'

'But the real blacks? The ones you called slaves? Where do they meet?'

'On the waterfront. There's a bar called Tonton's.'

'Four clubs, then. Would I be welcomed in Tennis and Tonton's?'

'You'd need an invitation to The Tennis. And I wouldn't just drift into Tonton's. They're proud, and they might think you were slumming.'

As they returned to the Waterloo, where McKay invited his host to tea and little cakes, which many of the multicolored were having English-style, the reporter asked: 'Is it necessary on an island with such a small population to have this rigorous caste system?' and Bart replied: 'We want it that way. Each group is most determined to protect its own little corner of strength.' He hesitated, then added: 'Of course, citizens in the French islands don't feel it so necessary, nor the Dutch, nor the Brazilians, nor, in some ways, the Spanish. But we're an English island, not a British one, and we're jealous of our English heritage.' As Millard rose to check into his hotel finally, Wrentham said: 'And we're the ones, all of us of whatever color, who preserve it.'

McKay had been on the island seven hours without seeing the inside of his hotel, and he did not know what to expect. But when he pushed open the two swinging half-doors of the Belgrave and looked into the archaic lobby, the s.p.a.cious dining room with its teakwood chairs and the lovely porch beyond with wicker furniture and a broad view of the Baie de Soleil, he cried aloud: 'They employed Joseph Conrad and Somerset Maugham to decorate this place!' and he knew then that he would spend happy and profitable hours beneath the seven big fans that rotated slowly to keep the air fresh without cooling the food on the linen-clad tables laid with glistening silver.

The light-colored girl at the desk said with a soft island lilt: 'Mr. McKay, your Hippolyte has taken your bags to room six, which has one of our best views down the baie.'

Room 6 had not only a superb view of the baie but also a glimpse of the Caribbean beyond; a black maid with an immense smile came to tell him she had unpacked his bags and that he would find his shirts here and his socks there. She said: 'My duty, mastuh, to see you happy. Ring bell, tell me when you want hot water in your bath.'

'Is the water in the tap good to drink?'

'Good me, maybe not you. I bring bottles.'

He asked her when dinner was served, and she said: 'Eight o'clock prompt, sir. Very punctual.'

After a hot bath and a short nap, McKay sat on his veranda with a tall drink as he watched the tropical sun descend with a crash into the baie: Three weeks of evenings like this, All Saints will look better and better.

When he went down to the dining room he found it much more animated than before; now a flurry of barefooted black waiters in semimilitary green uniforms moved studiously about the room, handing incoming diners big printed menus. The fare seemed to be the typical heavy English food that a small country inn north of London might provide, day after day throughout the year. Little concession was made to the fact that All Saints was in the tropics and that the waters nearby teemed with fish. Wondering where an island without much agriculture got its supply of beef and pork and lamb, Millard settled upon a roast chicken with stuffing. Looking up from the menu, he became aware that a fine-looking, well-dressed young man of very light coloring-perhaps a level four, McKay thought-was studying him intently, and the concentration continued until McKay grew embarra.s.sed. But then the man got up from his table and went out to the hotel desk, obviously making inquiries as to who the newcomer might be.

Returning to the dining area, he came directly to McKay's table, to say in a carefully cultivated English accent: 'I say! You must excuse my rudeness, but aren't you McKay, the man I've been looking for?' He coughed modestly, and added: 'And I should think you might have been looking for me.'

McKay rose, extended his hand, and said: 'Millard McKay, Detroit Chronicle.'

'I know. Please be seated. I'm Etienne Boncour. Jeweler and chairman of the Tourist Board. It's my job to greet writers like you. To facilitate whatever it is you came to do. For we appreciate the value of your visit.'

'Won't you join me?'

'Oh no, I mustn't intrude on a guest. But I'd be most gratified, really I would, if you'd join me over there.' Then, realizing that this must also be intrusive, he laughed appealingly and said: 'I mean, since we are in the same business, more or less.' When McKay looked puzzled, as if unable to see how the jewelry business and newspaper work could be related, the young man said: 'I mean, I'm often engaged in writing publicity for our island, and you write too.'

The explanation was so gracious and so obviously well intended that McKay could not resist. Picking up his napkin, he moved to the other table, where he said: 'I've pretty well decided on the chicken, but tell me, where does your island get all the meat on this menu? The beef and pork?'

'Refrigerator ships from Miami, but forget the beef and chicken. The chef always keeps a fish or two which he'll fix for special customers. That's what I'm having, and if you'd like, I'll alert him to cook up one of his bigger ones.'

'I would like that,' and while they waited for the sea ba.s.s baked in fennel, Boncour said: 'Don't let my accent confuse you. I'm part of the French contingent on All Saints. Been here since 1620 or thereabouts. Family's never left. But I did go to Durham in England for my education.'

'Jewelry store, Tourist Board ...'

'And member of the Gee-Gee's Executive Council. That's the most fun.'

'How did all that happen?'

'The business? My grandfather started it when tourists began to arrive. The education? I did well in school and won a rather substantial bursary. The council? In the old days, only white men of impeccable background and usually born in Britain. Recently the authorities have been reaching out to a few men of color, and I'm one of that lucky breed!' And McKay thought: I was right. He is a four.

'Does your council have any real power? Or is it what we call "window dressing"?'

'Nice question. Let's say we're made to think we have power, but actually, Gee-Gee decides things pretty much as he wishes.' Then, fearing that this might appear in print, he corrected himself: 'There's a breath of freedom blowing in from the sea. We're terribly anxious to see how our new Gee-Gee responds to it.'

'Hope the food comes soon. I'm starved,' McKay said. Boncour glanced at his watch, and this led to a whole new path of conversation, for McKay asked: 'Is that a Rolex you're wearing?' and when the jeweler nodded, McKay said like an admiring schoolboy: 'I've never seen one. Just the ads in glossy magazines,' and Boncour slipped the watch from his wrist and handed it over.

McKay was fascinated by the sharp styling, the rea.s.suring heaviness of the watch: 'Feels as if it could run for a hundred years.'

'I've never heard them claim that.'

'Since I saw my first good Swiss watch at age fourteen ... in a Canadian shop ... I've wanted one. But they're murderously expensive, aren't they? Cheapest Rolex I ever saw was ninety-five dollars, American.'

'The one I'm wearing'-it had a solid-gold case-'sells retail for many times that,' Boncour said. 'I don't own it. Just wear it now and then to be sure it's working.'

'What does an ordinary Rolex, the kind I might buy if I had the money ...' Millard began, but Boncour hushed him: 'Mr. McKay, I didn't visit your table to peddle watches. But if you stop by the shop in the morning, of your own volition, it could be that I might surprise you.'

When the fish arrived, with a crisped skin and decoration of fennel, Boncour ordered a bottle of wine, and it became a gala dinner, with Boncour describing the island as if it were an entirely different place from the narrowly restricted one that Wrentham had talked of that afternoon: 'There is great freedom of spirit here. Much human happiness.'

After the fish had been consumed, McKay summoned the courage to ask: 'Does a man like you, well educated, familiar with European countries and customs ... do you experience any discrimination?' Immediately he added: 'I'm a newspaperman, you know. But I'll not quote you.'

'No censorship here.'

'On the other Caribbean islands?' McKay asked, and Boncour replied: 'All the English islands are pretty much the same. I have two other stores, you know. Barbados and Trinidad. Not much difference.' Then he added: 'In the islands where I have my shops, everyone knows my views. Of course there's discrimination, but it's tempered with decency. And the whites are sensible enough to offer us concessions, tiny perhaps in your view, in ours very significant.'

'Like what?'

'Let's put it this way. The supreme social accolade open to us non-whites is to be invited to Gommint House. Major Leckey calls you on the phone and you tremble, thinking that maybe lowly you is going to be invited, and he says in his crisp, hesitant voice: "That you, Boncour? Good. Leckey here. Could you possibly break free and come to a little reception Gee-Gee is holding, Thursday at dusk? Good." '

'Then what happens?'

'I rustle out and get my hair cut, ask my maid to press my white suit, and up I go to Gommint House, where I see that I am one of only seven men of color, and I am, to put it frankly, elated that I have been allowed entrance to the Holy of Holies. And Gee-Gee, at least the last one we've had, is no fool, for lost in the middle of the crowd will be one jet-black man, to prove that Gommint House is available to all.'

Then the light touch vanished, as Boncour said slowly and softly: 'But when the gala ends, the taxis arrive to carry the important white people over to The Club for their dinner. The colored in their family cars ride out to The Tennis for their dinner. I come to the Waterloo, while the lone black man stops off at Tonton's, where his mates josh him enviously for having played the swell.'

All Saints, like Trinidad and others, was a Crown Colony, and no one on the island was likely to forget it. It had never had an island legislature such as Barbados or Jamaica had enjoyed, although Jamaica had lost its government after the Governor Eyre disaster, and had reverted to Crown Colony status. All Saints did have two small advisory bodies to which whites and browns aspired, but since the island belonged in theory to the crown, ultimate power rested with the monarch's representative, the governor general. If he was prudent, he listened to his advisers and tried to avoid acting contrary to their strongly held convictions, but he knew and they knew that when push came to shove, he pushed with sufficient power to nullify their shoving.

Common sense prevented the system from becoming a tyranny, and cooperation between the Executive Council, comprised of mostly white appointed officials, and the Legislative Council of twelve, including five elected members, served to maintain an illusion that the general populace had some say in the government.

Etienne Boncour was one of the five elected members; officially he represented Bristol Town's business community, but emotionally he was known as one of the three members who had strong ties with the French component. In any important vote he and the other two Frenchmen were smothered by what was called 'the alliance of proper Englishmen,' a situation that generated no ill will, for as one Englishman growled at The Club: 'Our French? They've jolly well been proper Englishmen for the last hundred years.'

In the morning, but not too early, lest he betray his eagerness, Millard strolled over to Boncour's jewelry shop to see, as he told the owner, 'what the story is on these Rolexes.' The story was shocking. A solid-gold Rolex could cost upward of $2,500, an honest one in a lesser metal but with all the features, $125, but after Millard had inspected the less-expensive ones, realizing that he could not afford even them, Boncour amused him by producing, from a case in another part of the shop, a rather good-looking copy made in Hong Kong, indistinguishable from a real Rolex but priced at $17.50.

'Amazing,' Millard said. 'How do you tell the difference?'

'The copy falls apart in three months. The real one lasts forever.' And it was then that McKay discovered one of the secrets of doing business in the Caribbean: Boncour's shop had exquisite jewelry and gifts for sale to the island's white trade, but also hordes of low-cost imitations for tourists, local blacks and sailors off pa.s.sing ships.

At this point Boncour was called away by an entering customer, and Millard was left alone to study the shop. Before he could see beyond the high-priced display cases and the low, he was distracted by the two golden-skinned girls who tended the shop, and they were so refreshing, so graceful with flowers in their hair, that he thought: It's not fair to young unmarried Englishmen to have girls as beautiful as that around, and of the wrong color.

When Boncour returned he said seriously: 'I know what it is to want a really good watch. That's how I got into the business. I have a Rolex here, not new, but nearly so. Man brought it in to be fixed, and he may have stolen it, because two weeks later he was murdered. The police and I advertised everywhere, even on other islands, but I never found the owner. I want to get rid of it. I want my expenses for the replacement parts I had to send for and the advertising. I'll let you take it off my hands for thirty-two dollars.'

Millard stepped back and looked at Boncour. As a newspaperman in Detroit he had investigated every kind of scam: the supposed millionaire who had died intestate in the Nevada gold fields, the bait-and-switch sales, the cruel deception in which widows deposited their savings. He not only knew the old angles, but he had also learned to be on the alert for those new tricks which had not surfaced before.

'That's a good watch. Worth a lot more than thirty-two dollars.'

'Right on both counts.'

'But I'd want police clearance on it before I could be interested.'

To McKay's surprise, Boncour said: 'You'd certainly get it! I want a record too ... of having cleared up the case,' and, pocketing the watch and some papers relating to it, he led McKay to the police station, which could have been a fake, except that it had a permanent sign outside and two uniformed officers behind the desk.

'The chief in?' Boncour asked, and one of the desk men indicated with his shoulder that the inner door was open. Inside, McKay faced a colored police sergeant in a natty twill uniform, who asked jovially: 'Who's done what?'

Boncour spoke, placing watch and papers on the desk: 'It's that watch the murdered man left. I have about thirty-two dollars in it, new parts and those advertis.e.m.e.nts. Mr. McKay, newspaperman from Detroit, needs a watch and is willing to pay the thirty-two dollars.'

'So what do you want?'

'Police verification that I didn't steal it. A receipt so that Mr. McKay can take it back with him to the States.'

'Why haven't you looked for a buyer here?'

'Thirty-two dollars is a lot of money for most of my customers. And it is essentially a used watch.'